Benchmarking of service quality with data envelopment analysis

This paper proposes a data envelopment analysis (DEA) approach to measurement and benchmarking of service quality. Dealing with measurement of overall service quality of multiple units with SERVPERF as multiple-criteria decision-making (MCDM), the proposed approach utilizes DEA, in particular, the pure output model without inputs. The five dimensions of SERVPERF are considered as outputs of the DEA model. A case study of auto repair services is provided for the purpose of illustration. The current practice of benchmarking of service quality with SERVQUAL/SERVPERF is limited in that there is little guidance to whom to benchmark and to what degree service quality should be improved. This study contributes to the field of service quality benchmarking by overcoming the above limitations, taking advantage of DEA’s capability to handle MCDM problems and provide benchmarking guidelines.